


Decline

by seamen_demon



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-09-15
Updated: 2004-09-15
Packaged: 2019-05-31 19:45:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15126602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seamen_demon/pseuds/seamen_demon
Summary: It had become some foreign, uncharted territory, though this wasn't the first time it had happened. It was just the first time it had happened like this.





	Decline

**Author's Note:**

> A copy of this work was once archived at National Library, a part of the [ West Wing Fanfiction Central](https://fanlore.org/wiki/West_Wing_Fanfiction_Central), a West Wing fanfiction archive. More information about the Open Doors approved archive move can be found in the [announcement post](http://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/8325).

Author: caru  
Title: Decline  
Character: Josh  
Category: Angst  
Pairing: Sam/Josh  
Rating: R  
Summary: It had become some foreign, uncharted territory, though this wasn't the first time it had happened. It was just the first time it had happened like this.  
Author's Notes: This story briefly bounces around between some of Josh’s past and to after the effects of ITSOTG. I really had absolutely no idea where this was going when I started it, it was just random sentences I somehow managed to string together and make slightly comprehensible. Feedback adored since this is my second TWW fic, or more accurately, my second fic ever.

The snow was like a vice-grip that winter, clutching their quaint house with icy fingers, a torrent of white through the night sky in an enticing dance of death. He and Joaine watched with slack expressions as his father and uncle carefully maneuvered a recliner through the front door, the moving van a dot of distant grey in the driveway past his father's shoulder. Josh was eight and Joanie was twelve, but death was new to them both.

"Where do you want this?" his father grunted, fingers barely grasping along the edges of the leather chair, struggling to keep hold.

His mother directed the two men's work with an exhaustion that seeped from her pores, beyond physical, getting stronger and stronger with each wrapped box she peeled open to discover contents she had no use for, or some contents that were immeasurable in their value.

He clutched Joanie's hand tighter as his mother turned, sad eyes flashing towards the pair standing in the kitchen doorway, lost among a world that had upped and changed on them.

"You two head upstairs," she ordered with a dismissive wave of her hand in the direction of the staircase, "you'll just get in the way down here. I'll make you some lunch in a couple minutes."

He and Joanie stole away upstairs as a loud crash emerged from the living room accompanied by a string of soft curses. With Joanie's door concealing them from this strange alternate universe they had somehow tripped into, they sat in the middle of the floor crossed legged and face-to-face, Joanie thoughtfully doodling on Josh's open palm as means of entertainment. The snow was too thick for her to find better things to do this weekend, Josh knew he was only second best now that she had proclaimed her maturity and denounced his.

"Do you remember her?" she asked softly, brows creased and tongue peaking out from between her lips as she drew a bird on his palm with intense concentration, every stroke of the purple pen tickling the tender skin.

"No." he had answered, trying to recall his grandmother's face but all he could remember was a blurred image of grey and pink adorned in a vast array of house slippers and colorful aprons.

"She carried peppermints in her pockets and had a glass of wine every night."

Josh waited for more but it seemed to be the only thing Joanie could remember.

· * * *

His memory faded in and out during the first weeks in the hospital, most of the time, though, he didn't even remember where he was anymore. His mind continuously danced between times. He'd close his eyes and imagine things, feeling as if he was eternally trapped somewhere between being asleep and being awake and that it was the most hellish place he had ever known. Sometimes the dull hell would be penetrated by a touch or a voice, sounding weak and distant among the near constant beeping in his ears.

The first time his vision cleared and he closed his hand around something firm and strong it wasn't a hand, nor was the first thing he saw a familiar face. The blank white ceiling stared back at him and the side of the hospital bed was cold in his grip as confusion swamped him and he struggled to swallow past the acidic taste in his mouth, unable to feel his face or raise his head from the hospital bed. He tried to form words, each name he thought to call stuck in his throat, caught in uncertainty. Forcing himself to remember past the haze he had been in for what felt like decades now, he tried to reach for his last memory. Sam's voice near his ear, shaken but comforting. He tried to form the name on his lips but it fell into the empty room, less than a whisper.

He heard a toilet flush off to his right, a facet run, a door open and shut, then a face swimming into view, hard to discern, a warm hand replacing the cool metal that had been tight in his grip. Hard lines in a round face, sadness and hopefulness and happiness all there, written in braille. He tried to reach up and touch the face but it only half-raised before falling short, the movement felt like too much, too soon, and his chest pulled tight.

"Mom?" he didn't recognize his own voice, scratching across the word like sandpaper.

"Yes, Joshua," she whispered, smoothing a hand down his cheek with the world slowly beginning to disappear no matter how much he kept reopening his eyes to slide her back into view.

"You cut your hair…" he tightened his grip on her hand and allowed his eyes to remain closed but forced himself to stay awake, to listen if he couldn't see. She gave a watery smile and held his hand tighter in response, even if this was the eighth time in two weeks that he had woken with insane drabble falling weakly from his lips, as if his mind was slowly deteriorating along with his body.

"Do you like it?" she entertained these things, just tried to keep talking for however long he could manage to listen.

"Mm`hm." His eyes were still closed and the makings of a smile curled the corner of his lips. She allowed herself to keep hoping, the hope growing stronger each time she saw him open his eyes and talk, each time she heard from Donna, or Sam, or any number of his friends, including the President, who came by to see him each day. Sometimes she had to force Donna to take a break, or Sam to return to work when he vehemently insisted that he could stay just 10 minutes longer, 10 minutes always turning into 20 then 30.

She leant in closer when Josh began mumbling again, "Jus dun turn into one of those blue hair ladies…" he teased, forcing her smile to grow. She wanted to call Donna or Sam, or anyone, in here to see this. To enjoy this with her. They were getting their Josh back, scarred but not broken, and she finally allowed the doctor's constant words of assurance and hope to sink in and register.

She stroked his cheek and the back of his hand, continuing with the light teasing that they both seemed to crave, "I'll succumb to the humiliation of graying hair if only to save you the embarrassment of having a blue haired mother."

He tried to force his eyes open again but only half made it there, words tumbling from his lips again, slurring together and it took her a moment longer to decipher them.

"Don't look that bad with gray hair."

But he had already slipped away again before she could formulate a response.

· * * *

The house wasn't new, just different. The first few weeks after moving in Josh had been immersed in the soul purpose of exploring this ancient world with it's wooden floor boards and imagined hidden panels that led to secret rooms in the attic, or maybe the basement. Either way they were secret and he had to unearth them. This fixation only lasted for a week, after settling in was less of an adventure and more of an exercise in exhaustion when trying to remember when he woke up in the middle of the night that the bathroom wasn't down the hall where he had always remembered it to be. Or the light switch wasn't on the left side of the door but the right and the knob now turned in a completely different direction.

To him, Joanie wasn't gone, but on a type of vacation. They were all in that alternate universe bubble that death created and soon they would return to the real world. His eyes would catch the calendar on the wall at the dinner table, mentally calculating each number as if any day now he expected that to happen, if he just kept counting.

He poked at the peas on his plate, the table awkwardly silent and interrupted only by the sounds of silverware clanking. He focused on the soft popping of the ice cubes melting in his drink.

"What happened to your jacket?"

He looked up at the sound of his father's voice, too loud, too forced and blinked in confusion but his mother answered for him, eager to fill the deafening quiet.

"He tore a hole in the sleeve, I'll need to buy some threading needles tomorrow to sow it back up for him."

As if he wasn't even here, and he pretended he wasn't. Instead imagining any number of places that Joanie and he could be as everyone else tried to ignore the empty seat at the table.

It would take years before the empty chair stopped being an prominent fixture in Josh's dinner table thoughts, never disappearing but blurring into a permanent backdrop. It would take a much shorter time for his eyes to stop catching the calendar, for him to stop counting the days.

· * * *

The bar was dimly lit, the beer wasn't cold enough and the stereos played Miles Davis, soft and gentle and tragically sad. It was small and dotted with people, not much to look at, filled with cigarette smoke that burned his eyes. It was exactly what he needed outside of Donna's constant mother henning and Leo's refusals to allow him back to work. But he could come here, could drink a warm beer and feel the overwhelming need to vomit because of it but he damn well still had his freedom. Just making a point, was all.

"Josh, what the hell are you doing?"

He looked up from his long neck beer to Sam, who stood next to Josh's barstool somehow managing to look amused and annoyed at the same time.

"I'm having a drink." He exclaimed defiantly, returning his attention to the beer and making a show of ignoring Sam.

"Donna called."

Josh sighed, "Foiled again."

"This is pretty stupid just to make a point." Sam climbed onto the barstool next to him, surprising him because he half-expected Sam to forcefully drag him back to the safe confines of his apartment. He only realized now that that was stupid, of course Sam wouldn't do that. God forbid they actually touch him because he might break.

"It's a very valid point." He watched the spot on the wall behind his head in the mirror over the bar, not meeting Sam's eyes, as he raised the beer to his lips only afterwards remembering the beer was warm by now. He tried not to make a disgusted face as he forced himself to swallow.

"I don't think you should be drinking with that medication…" Sam began, amusement having fled, concern taking over as he watched Josh raise the beer.

"God, Sam, I get enough of that stuff from Donna…"

"So you staged a jail break because we're concerned?"

"I staged a jail break because everyone's suffocating me here." Liquor mixed with pain medication, doubling what felt like the effects of drunkenness but he hoped weren't. One beer wasn't enough and he seemed coherent, to himself, at least. He wondered how other people saw him. He felt Sam's eyes boring into the side of his face and feebly attempted again, "Leo should at least let me come back to work already…"

"Yeah, cause you're clearly setting a great example for office conduct."

"I'm not in the office, Sam! I can get damn well sloshed if I want to, I'm not fucking 10 years old anymore, Jesus fucking Christ." His voice too loud, drawing the attention from the few people still in the bar but he failed to notice, still looking straight ahead and not at the astonished expression on Sam's face at his unexpected anger.

"I didn't mean…" Sam's words trailing off and Josh tried to figure out what Sam wouldn't mean by that. Obviously Sam didn't know where that protest was leading either, "Look, I'm sorry, Josh, it's only a few more weeks of this. The doctor said-"

"Fuck the doctor."

Sam looked offended, "The doctor saved your life, Josh."

An inch had saved his life and he was already starting to wish it hadn't.

"I feel fine!"

"I'm sure somewhere along the line we can attribute that to a hardy dose of pain medication, which I'm positive you shouldn't be drinking with-" as Sam snatched the beer Josh was once again raising from his hand.

His eyes flashed to Sam's in anger but Sam's expression was challenging, his hand clutching the beer tightly. A staring contest ensued. Only Sam's softening features and a quiet, "Let me take you home." Managed to break it. Josh's own posture relaxed a little and Sam continued, "You can help fix the world tomorrow, for now, we're all just trying to help fix you. Let us, okay?"

He wanted to tell Sam that he wasn't sure he could be fixed, that he had been broken long before that bullet tore through his body. That the bullet's only purpose was to make it real, to make the angry red scar on his chest a testament to it. A stop sign to say ‘look, this man’s scarred and if you stay much longer he’ll scar you too’.

He didn't say any of this, having to tear his eyes away from Sam and glancing at the clock above the bar to give him something else to do, "What if it's technically already tomorrow?"

"It's not tomorrow until we say it is." Sam retorted softly.

Josh regarded him for a moment, "And what if we never say?"

Sam was thoughtful, words carefully chosen,

"Then it'll always be tonight."

· * * *

It was three weeks into work and every day he felt more drained, felt more like a piece of himself was lost amongst each page of every folder or report handed to him. His mind wandered at the most inopportune of moments, standing there in the middle of the Oval office, hands clasped behind his back but gaze far away and vacant even as the conversation registered to him. It was like he couldn't bring the world into focus, even if he wanted to, but the problem was that he didn't want the world in focus anymore.

Sam had fallen into step next to him in the hallway and it hadn't even occurred to him until he neared his office door, a little stunned when he noticed the other man's presence.

"When is your Mom coming up?" Sam didn't seem to notice it.

"Huh?"

"I said when's your Mom coming up? Wasn't she supposed to this weekend? I was looking forward to seeing her again…" Sam attempted a weak but genuine smile.

"Oh…I completely forgot about that…" he stopped at his office door, raising a hand to his head guilty and going over the last phone conversation with his mother. He frowned at Sam, "I think I'm gunna have her cancel…"

"Why?"

"I'm not really…I didn't really…prepare. To have her here this weekend. I-ah, I don't really have the time.." he trailed off, realizing a little too late how horrible that sounded that he didn't have time for his mother.

Sam nodded sympathetically, "Sure…just…tell her I said hey?"

Josh nodded and rested his back against the door frame. "I will. I think she likes you more than she likes me…" he forged a soft laugh but it seemed too grasping, even to him.

Sam once again attempted a smile, throwing a thumb over his shoulder in the general direction of his office, "See you later?"

Josh gripped the door frame behind him in his hand, giving a small nod, "Yeah." And leaning his head back as he watched Sam disappear down the hallway.

· * * *

With his face raised to the sky he almost felt like he wasn't standing on the sidewalk in front of an all night video store, freezing to death with a street lamp blinding the right side of his face. The stars were pinpricks in the sky tonight, seemingly fading further away as each moment ticked by. He was unaware of how long he had been standing here loitering while Sam picked out a single movie from inside.

They did this, occasionally. A movie or a drink, something that re-enforced their friendship to ensure they didn't drift too far apart in a world where work consisted of 99% of their lives.

"Okay-"

His attention was drawn away from the stars, returning to Earth to look over as Sam finally arrived with a bag in hand, breath coming out in puffs of vapor.

"-I got Casablanca."

He hiked up his eyebrows in realization, "I've…actually never seen that movie."

"I guess that makes it a good choice, then." Amused, Sam fell into step next to him as they treaded back towards the car, "How could you have been existing in the conscious world and yet not seen Casablanca?"

He was defensive now with his coat pulled tightly around himself, "Well…everyone's always talking about how damn good it is I just never thought to actually sit down and watch the stupid thing."

"`I am shocked! Shocked to see there is gambling going on in here!`"

Josh just stared at him for a moment, equally amused at Sam's satisfied expression, "You do realize that…when I said I had never seen it that would mean I'd have no idea of cultural references to it…right?"

"`Here's looking at you, kid?`"

"Okay, I have to admit I've heard that one before."

"See? Casablanca. You're not a complete loss."

The drive to Sam's place was silent and uneventful and while watching the world whiz by Josh realized he couldn't see the stars anymore, but he could see Sam, just as bright and breathtaking and out of reach as stars were. The thought came upon him suddenly and unbidden, feeling better with Sam tonight than he had in months but somewhere in the back of his head, where this high-off-Sam feeling wasn't quite so prominent, something told him that he was sabotaging this friendship. That it was inevitable he should do so, that he had already done it once before so why not go for it twice?

Sam's place was immaculate but Josh expected no less.

"We can order Chinese food if you're hungry, I've got a menu somewhere to this really good place a few blocks away…" Sam tossed his keys on the coffee table and began removing his coat, watching Josh.

"Nah, I'm good" He reached into the plastic bag for the DVD.

"Popcorn?" Sam offered instead, quirking his eyebrows invitingly.

He laughed a little, trying to figure out how to work Sam's remote, "I'm fine, Sam, I'm a cheap date, okay?"

Sam merely shrugged, "Your loss, I'm making popcorn though." Matter-of-factly, "And you can't have any."

An hour later and Josh had eaten all of Sam's popcorn.

"What do you think of the movie so far?" Sam questioned half-way through as they sat side by side, their backs against the front of the couch as they sat on the ground. He wasn't sure how they had ended up on the ground or even why considering the number of comfortable places in the room.

"Why are we on the ground?" confused as he munched on popcorn, brows drawing together.

"You said the couch was hurting your back."

"Oh."

Silence.

"Then why are you on the ground?"

"I felt guilty for being all comfortable."

"Oh." After a moment he offered a shrug in the direction of the screen, "Movie's okay."

Sam blinked a little at him, as if he had just committed a terrible offense, "You don't like it?"

"S`okay."

"You are a strange man…"

"Hey, why are you trying to impose your views on me?" his tone light and teasing, looking over to Sam who smiled back, "You know, this friendship is turning more and more into a dictatorship. First you get to pick the movie and then you get to make me like it too."

"I'm just trying to help you establish some good taste."

"Yeah, I'm starting to question my taste in company too, keeping you around all the time..."

"Hey!"

He laughed and shot a glance over to Sam again, the movie briefly abandoned for the light banter, "You started it by insulting my taste."

Defeated, Sam simply reached for his beer on the coffee table pushed in front of them, "Fine, we agree to disagree on the obvious greatness that is Casablanca."

Josh, nonchalantly, merely shrugged, "Fine, whatever."

When the movie was over Josh tried not to act disappointed when Sam pulled away to stand and flip on the light, their night coming to what seemed like an abrupt end but really hadn't been. He remained there sitting on the floor with his back against the couch, watching Sam as he ejected the DVD and returned it to it's case, beginning to clean up the few beer bottles on the coffee table. After a few moments, he stood to help Sam clean up silently, trying to prolong this evening a little longer so he wouldn't have to go back to feeling exhausted and drained, to feeling less than who he was meant to be. It felt as if Sam had somehow managed to capture these pieces of Josh that he was missing, had stored them away and only allowed Josh to feel them again when they were together. Something was bothering Sam, plaguing him in the tensing of his neck and back and it surprised Josh that he could tell when Sam wanted to say something so badly his entire body compressed tightly.

"What is it?" as he dumped the popcorn bag and some few stray pieces that had fallen to the ground into the kitchen trash can, Sam with his back turned, pouring out the rest of the leftover beer down the sink.

"When you…" Sam started before sighing in frustration, prompted by a couple beers but his decision making abilities not completely altered because of it. He knew what he was asking Josh but he was sure that if he asked it like this then it would sound all wrong, so he started again. "What do you remember of Rosslyn?" He turned to face Josh, curiosity inching into his voice.

Josh raised an eyebrow, slightly stunned, this question seeming to come from left field, a baseball that slammed him in the face and reminded him that things weren't quite the same. "What…What do you mean?"

"I mean…after you were…after you were shot and stuff. Do you remember anything?"

Josh tried to dismiss the questions, glancing away, "Nah…"

"Nothing?"

"I said no, Sam." He replied a little more firmly. Sam looked down and slowly turned away, continuing to pour the warm beer down the drain, offering a quiet apology.

It only frustrated Josh in turn, wanting Sam to understand, a sigh being torn from him, "I uh…I remember walking and then…I don't-just… being unconscious for what felt like a really long time. I remember waking up for the first time and everything after that. The rest is just…blurry water-colored pictures, yanno? Why do you wanna know?"

Sam shrugged his shoulders but wouldn't turn back around, "I was just wondering." 

Josh didn't say anything more until Sam was finished cleaning up and there was nothing left to do but continue talking or say goodbye.

"What do you remember?"

Sam slipped his hands into his back pockets and shrugged his shoulders only slightly, facing Josh now, "All of it. All of it that happened to me, at least. Someone yelling gun…the gunshots…shoving CJ down…"

"You shoved CJ down?"

Sam looked up as if just noticing Josh was standing there, "Yeah…" he replied quietly, tentatively, "it was just…reflex. Spur of the moment, I mean, I didn't really have the time to think-"

Josh nodded and looked down, fighting the sudden impulse to scratch his chest.

"We don't have to talk about it." Sam offered softly.

"I know that, Sam."

An awkward silence descended, Sam leaning with his back against the sink and arms folded over his chest, Josh hovering in the kitchen doorway.

Josh broke the silence first, "So…I'mma go." Purposefully making his tone reluctant, hoping Sam would offer for him to stay a little longer. "I'll see ya Monday… It was nice watching a crappy movie with you. Should do it more often." He offered with a small smile that Sam mirrored.

"It's not a crappy…" Sam just allowing himself to trail off and drop the resulting argument before it started.

Josh was in a crappy mood. He was always in a crappy mood lately and tonight he had found something, someone, who could fix that. Only for a little while. He was using Sam, manipulating him to get what he wanted and he knew that and yet he did it anyway. He was sure that said something about the kind of person he was, something he thought everyone should've known about him by now. Because tonight he had realized that Sam was stars, bright and breathtaking, but he knew that tomorrow, when he looked at Sam, he wouldn't think of stars anymore. He was sure that if he just closed his eyes, all of them would be falling.

Falling and falling but never connecting with anything, the descent lasting forever. Timeless. All of them were still falling, just not hitting the pavement this time.

As neither he nor Sam made any move to press the act of him leaving any further, he took a few steps forward, prompted by the belief that tonight would be amazing but disregarding the fact that tomorrow would be anything but.

"Josh-" Sam started, but it was too quiet and futile and Sam had known that before he had even begun.

He stopped mere inches from Sam now, not touching, his voice hushed because of their proximity, "I had…a really nice time tonight, Sam. A nicer time than I've had in far too long. I'm really not eager to let it end."

"And what happens tomorrow, when this doesn't seem like such a great idea anymore? What happens then, Josh."

It had been too long, he realized, for this to be simple again. It had become some foreign, uncharted territory, though this wasn't the first time it had happened. It was just the first time it had happened like this. He tried to convince Sam, he tried to convince them both.

"This is a good idea."

"No, it isn't."

"Yes it is!"

It was the decline of their friendship and he knew it. He just didn't understand why he kept going, why he kept pushing it, maybe just to see how far it could go. How far could he push Sam? When was the breaking point? Had it already been reached in the way that Sam looked defeated, even though Josh hadn't provided a valid argument in defense of what a great idea this was?

"No…" Sam attempted, one last time.

"Yes." And all Josh had needed to do was close the distance, pressing his lips against Sam's more hesitant ones, determined in the push of his lips against Sam's. The white cotton of the other man's shirt sliding through his fingertips as he searched for some kind of purchase, grasping first one hip and then both as the kiss became more fevered, looping his thumb through the belt of Sam's jeans. He raised his free hand to the back of Sam's head, tangling in the hair there and angling the kiss just so, every other action momentarily abandoned for the purpose of all his attention being fixated on this kiss.

They were relearning each other, lips parting only to breathe and let their hands roam together. Josh tried to count how long it had been since they had done this, he counted like he would count days on the calendar, he counted like he did the falling stars on Sam's stomach as he pressed his lips against each ladder of ribs, racking teeth and lips and nails across the flat skin, dipping his tongue into Sam's navel until the other man shivered and something like a beg fell from his lips.

Sam had kissed the scar and he had felt like crying, like shoving Sam away before he got too close to be burned by Josh, but it was far too late for that, the only thing there seemed left to do was lay there and stare at the ceiling, hands tangled in Sam's hair until he couldn't feel anything but this. Afterwards, when he looked at Sam, he didn't think of stars anymore.

Years later, on the heels of a re-election victory, Sam would leave him.

And Josh would let him.


End file.
